Tuesday, October 25, 2016

Obama and Clinton, Getting Nothing Right

Obamacare Premiums for 2017 Jumped 25% on Healthcare.gov

That’s the average rise for benchmark Obamacare insurance plans.

The average premium for benchmark 2017 Obamacare insurance plans sold on Healthcare.gov rose 25% compared with 2016, the U.S. government said on Monday, the biggest increase since the insurance first went on sale in 2013 for the following year.

The average monthly premium for the benchmark plan is rising to $302 from $242 in 2016, the Department of Health and Human Services said. The agency attributed the large increase to insurers adjusting their premiums to reflect two years of cost data that became available.

The government provides income-based subsidies to about 85% of people enrolled, and those credits will increase with the higher premiums. It said 72% of consumers on HealthCare.gov will find plans with a premium of less than $75 per month.

Large national insurers including AetnaAET0.69%, UnitedHealth Group, and AnthemANTM0.80%have said they are losing money on the exchanges, created under President Barack Obama’s national healthcare reform law, because patient costs are higher than anticipated and enrollment is lower than forecast. Both UnitedHealth UNH-0.47%and Aetna have pulled out of the exchanges for 2017.

As a result, consumers will have fewer plans to choose from. In 2017, in five states there will be offerings from only one insurance company. The government expects average monthly 2017 enrollment of 11.4 million people, up about 1 million from 2016.

Obama acknowledged last week that the law is not working perfectly but said the problems could be fixed if lawmakers created a government-run health insurance option that would help U.S. states where there is little or no competition.

Premium increases have become fodder for the presidential race, as Republican candidate Donald Trump calls for the repeal of the Affordable Care Act if he is elected and Democrat Hillary Clinton calls for expanding it.

The news “shows why the entire program must be repealed and replaced …. Mr. Trump knows the only way to fix our nation’s failing health care system is complete and total reform,” said Trump communications adviser Jason Miller.

The government agency said the 2017 premium increase comes after two years of very low increases in the marketplace for the second-lowest cost “silver” plan, the benchmark plan used to calculate cost-sharing subsidies.

Average premiums for the silver plan increased 2% in 2015 and were up 7% in 2016, the agency said.

The figure reflects premiums on Healthcare.gov, the federally run website that sells plans for about two-thirds of the states. Including four states and the District of Columbia, which run their own insurance marketplaces, and those that have reported data, the average premium rose 22%, the agency said.

Aetna plans to end expansion of its Obamacare businesses next year after losing money under the federal program.Photograph by Joe Raedle — Getty Images

Trump would have to successfully rub all the battleground states. When he spent 15 minutes of his time in yesterday's speech condemning the women coming forth against him, what do you really think his chances of doing that are?

The real issue the GOP should worry about (and I'm pretty sure they are) is how long are the coattails on Clinton's pantsuits. Hillary is so confident she is politicking in areas that should be Trump safe areas. Obama is out campaigning for Democrats all the way down to the state legislature level.

What we should be worried about now are big losses in the House and the real possibility of actually losing the Senate. The worst possible scenario is if Hillary is able to claim a mandate with numers to back it up.

Magnificent Ronald and the Founding Fathers of al Qaeda

“These gentlemen are the moral equivalents of America’s founding fathers.” — Ronald Reagan while introducing the Mujahideen leaders to media on the White house lawns (1985). During Reagan’s 8 years in power, the CIA secretly sent billions of dollars of military aid to the mujahedeen in Afghanistan in a US-supported jihad against the Soviet Union. We repeated the insanity with ISIS against Syria.